TouchStone
by carelessdodger
Summary: Harriet Potter was one bad day away from using one very bad spell. However, that all changed the day Harry's eyes locked onto Luna's and she saw the blown pupils and eery glow to the pale blue hue. For once, despite the mistrust Trelawny had instilled in Harry, she really, truly, honestly believed she was seeing a real seer. A seer who had her trapped and cornered. Ivar/Fem!Harry
1. Prologue

Harriet Potter pushed her feet to move faster, always faster. The tempo of her frantically beating heart was matched by only one thing, the pounding of her footsteps against the dewy grass. She knew this feeling well. Intimately even. The drive to run, to escape from the inescapable... Herself and that shadowy whole in her being that used to house a part of Voldemort.

She wasn't running from anyone, no masked assailant ready to take her down with a well-aimed spell. She wasn't running because she was bored, she always managed to find something to entertain her mind, be it between the dusky clouds of a good hour long broom flight or theories of new spells she would sometimes mentally run through. No, she was running because she needed to.

The energy that built up inside her, threatening to explode at a moments notice, needed an outlet. A valve needed to be turned to let the poison drain or Harry knew she would do something stupid. So very, very, very stupid.

The war that had ended decades of blood conflict was over for the passed year now. The school had been hurriedly rebuilt, her classmates, some of who she had fought side by side with, were back to smiling faces and teenage gossip. Everything was fucking sunshine, roses and rainbows all around... Unless you were ballsy enough to peek underneath that facade to the real wizarding world hiding underneath it like a child with a blanket, quivering from the bogey man that was peeping out their closet door. Pretenders, the lot of them, including herself. Perhaps, she was the greatest pretender there was, given the circumstances.

Harry was a big enough girl to admit she was envious of them. The ability to switch back into normality mode without a single glitch, not one faltering step. And here she was, at five in the morning, jogging around the school grounds in a sheen of light sweat because running was the better option than to snap at someone and do something that would send her away with a one-way ticket to Azkaban and the rest of her broken soul sucked out. Merlin know's Hermione had been pushing her button's lately.

It was mind boggling how Hermione could find so much interest in Harry's life, pushing her to date Sean Thomas of all people and to take up that Auror position that she had been gifted with, when the bushy haired witch should be focusing on her own path. Maybe then she would stop turning a blind eye to the fact Ron was still sleeping with Lavender while simultaneously dating Hermione. Merlin forbid, for once in her relatively short life, her own life would be hers and hers alone and not splashed about in a tatty newspaper, ordered, or planned out for her. As Harry had said, she was one bad day from using one very, very bad spell.

She needed to feel tired, she needed than bone weary ache to keep her grounded to reality because if she was tired, she was far less likely to send an Avada Kadavra at some unsuspecting soul that would unknowingly say or do the wrong thing in front of her. It was all jokes and games to them, the ones who had fled the country, or stayed out of the war completely until the last second when victory was assured to one side. Bloody cowards.

They could laugh and joke about it, they weren't the ones who had seen the aftermath, the dead bodies littering the floor, some of them ones you put there yourself. They weren't the ones who had been forced into the middle of it by a man everyone classed as a war hero, who died for the 'greater good'. If Harry ever got to heaven, or any type of astral plain of higher existence, unlikely with they way she was now, she would ask Albus if using child soldiers is under the classification of 'for the greater good' too. Or if she, Hermione, Ron, Luna and Neville had just lucked out in the lottery of 'whose life I can fuck up monumentally' he had held in secret. Actually, in retrospect, there were some other people she was willing and wanting to ask the same question, and they didn't have the excuse of being dead to hide behind.

These days her skin felt too tight, as if she had outgrown it but did not have the luxury of shedding like her reptilian friends. Her mind often wondered back to grim things she would try her hardest to push away, to pretend didn't happen, she hadn't done or seen been done. Everyone she knew was settled now, either in their internships, in their dream careers or finishing their last year of school. Harry, as bad as it sounded and as much as she hated herself for it, was missing the war. She missed it so horribly it gnawed at her gut and set her veins on fire.

Don't get her wrong, she didn't want to see the people around her die... Well, not all of them. She didn't want to kill anyone else, she didn't want the endless bloodshed or sleepless nights that came along with war. But she missed it all the same. She missed the thrill. The victory. The threat of defeat and knowing all too well the price you would have to pay if failure was in your future.

She knew what to do in a war, she knew how to act, how to plan, what to say and what to do. In this new peaceful world she found herself in, Harry was irrevocably lost. She felt like a snake in a pen full of bunnies, stuck between hunger, rage and an odd sense of bemusement as she watched the furry critters get on with what they believed was ever so important. Yes, because after all she had lived through, what shade Patil's nails were that day was life ending and must be remedied ASAP... She was losing her mind piece by piece.

The worst was she knew she was the only one who felt this way. And that only further pushed her away from anyone she used to be able to call a friend. Hermione, Ron, Ginny... Harry couldn't face any of them. How could she when she wasn't the girl she used to be? She felt so different, so foreign, that surely they would see through the mask she so diligently wore in the light of day and see the monster lurking underneath?

The bogey man reaching for their ankles, readying to drag them into her world? Because Harry could see herself doing just that, every damn time she saw her reflection, it was there, shadowed in her eyes, lurking in her skin, hiding in her pumping blood and sneering back at her viciously. That damned caged lion inside of her wanted out and it was getting tired of waiting. Wild animals weren't exactly known for their patience.

Harry was dead. This new person who wore her face was an unknown entity. Someone that was dangerous, Harry knew that all too well. To protect them, to protect herself, she did the only thing she could think of. Break away from it all. It was easy to fool the people who didn't fully know her to begin with, a muted smile here, an answered question worded just the way Harry would have said it before the war took place there, dusted with a bit of faked care and gentle gestures. Rabbits, they were all defenseless rabbits and she was sick of trying to protect them, but couldn't stop herself from doing so anyway. Catch 22.

And because of their own insecurities, their own desperate need for things to be the way they were, they lapped it all up. Harry knew the truth, as horribly grotesque as it was. Things would never be the same. They couldn't be. Harry didn't want them to be.

Not when you had gone through what Harry had. She had killed people, death eaters sure, but that did not change the fact she had taken human life for her own survival. She had lied, bare faced and bleeding, she had lied. She had stolen, broken into respectable places and took things that at the time, she wasn't a hundred percent sure needed to be stolen, but she did it anyway. Why? Because when it came down to it, in the throws of war, only two things mattered. You or them. Harry chose herself, and despite it being a full year later, she still felt like she was paying the price for that decision.

As good as she may have tricked her classmates, Mcgonagall and everyone else she unfortunately had to cross paths with, there was one Harry was sure saw straight through her. Luna Lovegood. It was all disconcerting really, the one person who always had their head up in the clouds, thoughts fogged with mythical creatures, was the only one who saw anything clearly. The teachers had gotten it all wrong, Hermione had never been the brightest witch of her age, she just liked to prove a point and show off while doing so in an act, despite her incessant assurance that she knew she belonged, to show the rest of the world she did. Hermione was insecure that way. No, Luna bloody Lovegood was the brightest, and she was sneaky about it too. Now wasn't that just a double fucking edged sword?

It started off innocently enough, simple staring at Harry through and over Hogwarts dinner tables. Even the odd glance in her direction when they had the same class. It was nothing to get worked up over, nothing to even consider in the bigger picture. But it grew. Sometimes Harry would spot Luna following her throughout the twisted hallways of Hogwarts, knowing full well the other woman had a class in the opposite direction she was heading.

Harry finally realized the gravitation of the situation after heading back to her head girls dorm room one night, that's right, she was head girl. It was a pity voting for sure, a thank you for all you've done, an act to make themselves feel better, not her. In the end, the following around could be brushed off easily, Luna might have felt the way she had, a comrade in emotional disturbance so to speak. The blonde could just want someone who felt the way she did around her, to not feel so damned alone as Harry did. However, what could not be brushed under the rug was when she headed back to her dorm that night and spotted Luna in there, taking Harry's shedded curls out from her hairbrush.

Any witch or wizard worth their salt knows the dangers of another magical being holding something containing their DNA. The spells they could cast by simply holding a drop of your blood or a lock of hair was never on the lighter side of the magical spectrum. The implications of such situations were so large that it was ingrained into pureblood society itself.

Why do you think purebloods often wore gloves out and about? Or refused to shake hands, instead choosing to bow their heads to each other in hello, or had longer hair than muggles? Blood could be easily collected from bare palmed handshakes, and haircuts were primarily done by yourself, because of it being too easy for someone to slip a tuft into their pocket once the hair was cut off. Letting a witch or wizard have your DNA was a bad and extremely poor move on your part.

Harry had tried to chase after Luna, the blonde running as soon as she spotted Harry at the doorway, but as smart as Luna was, she was equally elusive and after a good ten minutes chase, Harry had lost sight of the platinum head around a corner and thick crowd.

Two days later, having refused to go to anybody else about her little incident with Luna, Harry had not seen hide nor hair of Luna and she was in desperate need of a long jog to get the bubbling energy out of her. Hence, here she was. It was almost fitting in a way. Poetic. Exactly a year from that very day, Harry had been running through the forest of Dean, snatchers hot on her tail. Harry wanted to laugh. Another full circle.

Turning around the corner, heading towards the southern courtyard, a shimmer of pale yellow caught her gaze from the shadowed archway of the door leading into the castle.

Her steps faltered immediately as she skidded across the grass a little from her abrupt stop. Standing just at the crevis of the elaborate stone arch was the very woman who had been pushing Harry to her limits over the last few days.

Reaching to her jean clad leg, Harry pulled out her wand from its holster strapped tightly to her thigh. Her thin T-shirt didn't bar the cold Scottish winds from grazing against her skin, but Harry refused to wrap up tightly. Not only was jogging an outlet for her itchy need to do something, anything, it was also preparation in case shit did hit the fan. For it always did and It would be unlikely that you would need to run for your life when you were in appropriate clothing.

Luna knew she was there, the big sparkling pale eyes were staring straight at her, and Harry wouldn't have been surprised if she found out Luna knew about her jogs, the paths Harry would take and had waited for her in this very spot. But Harry was done with whatever game the blonde was playing, enough was enough, and with a tightening of her lips, Harry darted for her.

Luna was obviously anticipating her reaction and was gone in a flash down the shadowed, partially reconstructed corridor. Despite Luna making this into another game of cat and mouse, Harry refused to let this one go. And so the two ran, twisting around corners, dashing past statues, skidding down broken tiled flooring. As they ran further into the castle, the corridors got more and more destroyed, the bowels of Hogwarts having not been re-built yet, as no one really went down too far anyway so time was granted for its construction, unlike the classrooms and hallways.

Harry had managed to just make it around another corner of the labyrinth of Hogwarts underbelly when she saw Luna's hair flip and slip into a slither of an open doorway. Not wasting another second, knowing how fast the blonde could be when she wanted to move, Harry gave chase, barreling through the same door Luna had gone through, sending it flying into the wall outside with the force of her entrance, the bang echoing through the silence as it bounced back from the brick and closed ominously behind her with a thunk and clunk as a lock slid into place.

What she saw was something she wasn't expecting, though she should have expected it after the life she had. The room, only lit by a round hole in the domed ceiling, pilfered sunlight into the damp and dank room. The rest came to Harry in bits and pieces, like a puzzle, until it all fell into place in one bewildering picturesque question.

The mirror of Erised, large, shiny and still miraculously, despite the war that had taken place, in one piece stood right in the center, underneath the hole in the ceiling, making it look like it glowed from the shadows that lurked around the rest of the round room. In front of the mirror stood a little pillar, no higher than Harry's hip, with a flat square top, a bowl perched on the open space. The wooden bowl was not the cause of worry that flared up in Harry like a meerkat, but what was inside the bowl, highlighted by the sun shining down upon it, the liquid glistening a brilliant red that would be an envy of Godric Gryffindor himself. Blood. Luna stood by the bowl, by the mirror, housed and glowing in the same bright light of the sun, hand resting on the bowl as if she had been patiently waiting for Harry to arrive all this time.

Only as Harry edged in, step by cautious step, half expecting a booby trap to spring up, did she notice the writing on the floor, or better yet, the runes scribbled on hastily with white chalk. Fuck, she had never been the best at Arithmancy, and even on a good day with no ticking time bomb standing in front of her, it would take Harry a long while to translate what was written... Everywhere over the floor, some even creeping up the walls like twisting vines. So, she would bide her time then, at least until she got a gist of what the hell was going on. Harry's voice was light, even jovial as she spoke, once again, as always, hiding what she truly felt. She even managed to bring an easy dimpled grin to her face to walk hand in hand with her voice.

"What are you doing Luna? This doesn't exactly look like the homework they've set us, does it now?"

Luna chuckled, the sound no different then a wind chime singing in a small breeze, her long locks glinting as they danced around her as she gently shook her head, her eyes unnervingly never leaving Harry despite the movement. However, Harry did see the hand holding the bowl tighten further, a fraction, an action someone less observant would miss. But if Harry was but one thing, observant it was, and she didn't miss the twitch of Luna's body moving towards it and the mirror, closer. Almost protectively.

"Hey, Harry. No... No this isn't homework. But you already know that. You already know this is all wrong... Everything is all wrong. This isn't how it should be. But, I get it now, Godric, Rowena, Helena, Salazar... You weren't meant for here, I wasn't meant for here. Don't look at me like that, you don't need to worry, I'm going to fix it."

Harry swallowed as she eyed the blonde up and down wearily, trying to think on her feet, trying fruitlessly to find a way to defuse this situation. The only time Harry had ever heard the term fix it and her held together, it meant death. She was not going to die here, in this hidden room, by Luna of all people, after everything she had done to live. She had died once for the wizarding world, twice if you counted the time she was one, it could go get fucked if it thought she would pull a repeat for its sake.

"Alright Luna, you've lost me. How about you come with me and explain it all over a tankard of butterbeer and a bite of lunch? My treat."

As Harry spoke, still in that easy air as before, as if, as she believed, her life was being threatened, she slid closer and closer with each passing syllable. Letting her eyes wander around, never staying in one place too long, she secretly took in the bowl, definitely blood, Luna, delirium hinting at her eyes, but when had it not, and the mirror of Erised... Holy shit. Harry had expected to be greeted with the same thing she had all those years ago, the wraith-like shadows of her mother and father, crooning and petting her like she was loved. However, that was not what she was graced with this time, and the two couldn't be so jarringly different. Her whole body froze mid-step. Locked. Paralyzed.

It was her for sure, no mistaking those eyes and scar, but at the same time, it was a her she wasn't or ever would be. Her red hair was braided away from her face, but allowed free roam down her back in a cascade of curls. Her clothes looked old, leather, battered and bloodied... Like the dripping ax strapped to her hip. It was the eyes however that got Harry. Here, when she looked at her reflection, all she saw was anger, pain and death. Those ones, those strange ones in the mirror, still in the same hue as her own, shone back life in all its firey attributes. Life, peace and love.

Of course, the mammoth of a man standing behind her in the mirror was also as eye-catching as he was breath stalling. Black hair, braided close to his scalp, sides shaven, a faux-hawk style, silver beads woven in, glinting, iridescent. He was broad and tall, as bloody as her mirror counterpart, only grinning a grin that put Sirius Black's to shame. Real shame.

His eyes, much like hers, glowed in vivid multicolour, as unsettling and bright, but only this time in a magnificent blue instead of her Avada green as Ron had nicknamed it after a rather fierce glare on her part to him. The man in the mirror... No, man didn't fit him right. The warrior in the mirror crept closer to her counterpart, grazing her back with his front, and slid and arm around her waist. Mirror Harry only smiled brighter. Luna's voice, hot in her ear, was the only thing capable of snapping Harry out of her trance.

"You see it too don't you? Although... I suppose your's is slightly different."

Harry forced herself to swirl around and adamantly place her back to the mirror, a trick to stop herself from looking back into it and getting lost. She was done with games. Glaring at Luna as she scoffed, she crossed the difference between them and rounded on the blonde.

"What? That I apparently have a thing for mammoth, blood splattered guys? Yes, real insightful Luna. Now, if you're going to try and kill me, get on with it, maybe you'll succeed where Voldemort failed. But I promise you, you're only going to have one try at it."

Luna gave Harry her trademark dreamy grin, one that spoke of the blonde being in a mindful place that not many, if any, could reach. The movement of Luna's hand caught Harry's gaze and she idly noticed Luna was holding the blood bowl... And had pulled out two locks of ribbon tied hair. Blonde, obviously Luna's by the shade, and one blazing red and curly... Harry's hair from the hairbrush Luna had scavenged from.

Harry was about to jerk forward, to snatch the hair and bowl away from her, when Luna jerked herself in retaliation, almost dropping the hair into the bowl and making Harry's plan mute. Harry wasn't dumb, whatever Luna had planned balanced on those locks of hair falling into the bowl, and that was what Harry was trying to stop. So, with much regret and agitation, Harry stood still and stared as Luna's wispy voice floated out.

"You'll see in the end. We can't be happy here, we never can and never will be. We don't belong, Harry, not like everyone else. This isn't our home. You're going to hate me in the beginning, but you'll see in time. This is how it has to be, how it's already been, how it should have been all along. This is our path."

Harry's breath caught in her throat as her own eyes locked onto Luna's and she saw the blown pupils and eery glow to the mellow and pale blue hue. For once, despite the mistrust Trelawny had instilled in Harry from the get go, Harry really, truly, honestly believed she was seeing a real seer. A real seer who had just let go of the locks of hair while Harry had been distracted by her eyes.

The reaction was instantaneous. The bowl fizzled, bubbled and blew out black smoke, swirling and twirling as it seemed to have a mind of its own and zoomed towards the mirror, hitting it squarely and disappearing into the glass. The chalk markings on the rocky floor flared to life in brilliant gold and silver, flashing, pulsing with life. The mirror cracked, splintering right down the middle, the sound almost deafening as the mirror of Erised exploded, only for the glass to stop halfway from being blown across the room, and subsequently at them, to be sucked back in, only this time creating what looked like a swirling vortex of glittering mirror dust and shards. Then the wind came.

The artificial, unnatural wind was howling, boisterous, pushing, pulling and dragging Harry towards the mirror... Or what used to be the mirror. Harry scrambled for purchase in shock, but slipped and was dragged towards the mirror, only in the last possible second managing to grab a hold of the pillar in front of the portal and hang on for dear life. Luna's laugh broke out over the wind, tinkling and joyful.

"Just let go, Harry!"

Then, as crazy as all this had been, Harry watched with wide eyes as Luna simply held her arms out, as if expecting a hug, and got pulled into the mirror, vanishing into the star like mass of dancing glitter. Harry tried to hold on, but the longer she did, the stronger it felt like the wind was getting until her feet were literally lifted off the floor, her boot-clad toes inches away from entering the same vortex Luna had disappeared into. Harry had only enough time to shout out a series of curse's that would make even Fred and George blush, before she lost her battle, her fingers slipped in their grip, and she too was sent careening into the portal.

The sensation was indescribable, it was over in a nano-second, but felt like a lifetime, it was hot, it was cold, it was up, it was down, it was all and it was nothing. Then, in a flash, she was corporeal again... And falling.

It was only about six foot, but when she landed on something, bumpy, warm, sticky, hot and hard, the breath housed in her lungs escaped in a rushed whoosh, her sternum spasming in protest. Whatever she had landed on was rectangular, had something already on it, as she slipped off and fell even further to the unforgiving floor, the sticky hotness gluing to her clothes, face and front as her eyes finally adjusted and she could see again. It had felt like apparation, being splinched all over, then pieced back together stitch by agonizing stitch.

Her hand automatically went to her thigh holster, whipping out her wand as her other palm dug into harsh twigs and stones, pushing herself up into kneeling position. Only as she looked down at her wand, to make sure it was in one piece, did she notice what the red, sticky warm mess was. Blood... and a lot of it.

Harry's head shot up, looking at the table she had landed on, eyes widening as she saw a man strapped down upon it, throat slit as blood poured out and into a hole underneath, some weird priest of some kind staring at her with equally wide eyes, this time accompanied by a slack jaw, bloody dagger in one hand... And a fucking bowl of blood in the other. Where-ever she is, whenever by the way these men looked and were dressed, human sacrifice seemed to be the 'in' thing. Oh, dear Merlin, she was going to kill Luna... Luna!

Scrambling up onto her feet, wand tightly gripped just in case the muggle priest tried anything, Harry looked around her, trying hopelessly to find a flash of light blonde hair. But as she swiveled to look behind her, Harry stalled completely. One man would have been easy to obliviate, the other was dead and would not be able to speak of what he saw... But the crowd behind her, all watching, were very much alive and staring bewilderedly at her, obviously having seen her little less then incognito entrance. How the hell was she going to get out of this one? She wasn't going to kill Luna... She was going to skin her! She had just outed the whole Merlin damned wizarding kind, all because blondey thought she knew best. Luna better hope she never found her.

One man in the crowd said something loudly, a word she didn't recognize but obviously held some punch by the reaction of the mass of people watching her as if she was some fallen angel. It sounded like Velcro, or Velcrory... Maybe Valkyr, but none of it mattered as his hand fell onto the ax strapped to his hip by a leather cord and Harry acted on instinct. After all, in for a penny, in for Azkaban.

So, with not much regret, or thought really on her behalf, though who could blame her after the day she had, Harry lifted her wand and hit the man with a hard with a forceful Stupefy, wincing slightly as she realized her actions and watched as the man went sailing backwards into the crowd, taking a few down with him as he fell limply to the floor.

The crowd, all in weird leather clothing, some topless, even the women, seemed to squeeze in tighter together, strength in numbers and all that. Harry was just about to apparate out of there, try and find a way back to Hogwarts, hopefully this mishap not having reached the ministry yet, when one lone man, ncredibly tall, thin, with black... War paint dusted around his eyes, ending in points that sliced down his cheeks, stepped out of the crowd, strolling towards her as if the muggle man, for he was muggle, they all were, she could feel no magic emanating from anything within quite a big radius, hadn't just seen her send a man down with a flick of her wrist and a 'twig', hands held up in the universal sign of surrender that did not match the wide, toothy grin housed on his face. It reaked of insanity. A grin she had seen before. It looked strangely like the same grin from the man in the mirror of Erised, just slightly less vicious and more unhinged.

Harry's wand and hand flopped to her side as she looked heavenwards, praying for this to all be over, or a lightening bolt to send her out of her misery, three words escaping her mouth in a mirthless laugh.

"Bloody fucking hell."


	2. Nightmares

Nightmares are funny little things. Harriet Potter knew that. She had had her fair share of them. Some where mundane, the ones where you're trying to run, but no matter how much you push, it's like your trapped on the spot, a butterfly pinned to parchment paper, squirming, ready for inspection. Others, well, they where to be expected. Voldemort, the battle of Hogwarts, black screens of voids where she would only hear screaming. Yet, there where some that she could not remember, dreams but not dreams, the kind that you wake up from dazedly, not sweating or crying in fear, but with a lump in your throat and dread slugging through your limbs, feeling so heavy she couldn't move even if she wanted to. She never remembered those ones, could not glean a single image from them, but the feeling she was left with after one would forever haunt her. They didn't feel like dreams. They felt like memories.

Nightmares terrify you. Torment you. Warp and disease your mind. The worst? Sometimes these demented things are not of imaginations conjuring, sometimes they are birthed by memories, both fresh and suppressed. Yet, what no one wants to admit to, is that they tell you so much more about yourself than anything else. Then you awaken, the fear is over, and as daylight bathes your skin in golden yellow, so too does it fog and degrade the horrid dreams from your mind. People chose to forget what their nightmares had shown them. It was easier that way. Denial was pathed in golden bricks where the road to self-awareness and honesty was a craggy uphill scramble. Harry was no exception to that, blissful ignorance complemented her complexion, so she had never truly tried to recall those lost and dreadful nightmares. Nonetheless, faced with what Harry was now, that ignorance she had relished in previously unceremoniously turned its gaping muzzle to her and bit her right on the fucking arse.

The odd thing about repressed memories that masquerade as neglected nightmares is the funniest things can and will force you to face them. When the light is just right, in the throes of twilight, something you see, a glint, an object… A face can bring those nightmares crashing back into your mind like a bull raging against a stone wall. Bloody smashed horns and clouds of dust that clog your throat. Harry found her deeply buried night terrors frothing in her mouth from a quick glance to a blonde woman. Just a blonde woman. Nothing special. But that was the lie wasn't it? Special things always wear brass buttons, not gold and silver.

The bout of laughter that had torn itself free from Harry's throat as she looked skyward, damning herself, damning Luna, damning everything and anything she could pin blame on, had come to a spluttering stop as she saw the lanky man with war paint around his eyes take a confident step forward. It was just a flash really, a quick glint, but as he stepped forward, the decedent purple and pink light of dusk pilfering through the tree tops of the clearing she had found herself in, cast a beam of soft light upon his eyes. Harry froze. She. Knew. Those. Eyes.

She knew the constantly pinpricked pupil, giving the eye a constant look of alertness, cattish and hungry. She knew the almost yellow flecks, the emerald ring, the keen and vivid green shining back at her. She knew the sharp sweep of the lash line, thin and sleek. She knew the capricious heavy lid and upward twist to the outer corner. She had seen them squaring her up, gauging her, picking apart her faults and strengths like well cooked pork from bone because she had given herself the very same look each morn in the mirror. She knew those eyes because they were _her_ eyes.

Harry blinked, fluttered and shuddered, Goosebumps prickling at the back of her neck and arms. It was an odd feeling, she would admit. Seeing your own eyes reflected back at you from another's skull. Many people had the same colour eyes, be it green, blue, grey, brown or any other myriad of shades, but to see the exact shape, colour, flecks and predatorial glint? No… Wait? She thought she remembered something, but as soon as the image came, it was gone again, like a leaf that had been blown free from a tall tree, spiralling away into the vast wind.

The man, all tall limbed and skinny strength, much like herself, took a sharp step forward again at her confused stare, her fingers automatically tightened on her wand. Stomping down on the confusion, mentally stopping at trying to grasp that image that had fled her, she snarled and within a single blink of both their eyes, she sent the man sailing back across the clearing he had wandered out from.

There was no time for mental gymnastics or lost thoughts, not when these natives seemed hostile. Merlin, she had literally fallen into a human sacrifice, had the bastards blood caking her face, what more evidence did she need to not let her guard down and to get the hell out of dodge? How about the pen of dead fucking animals in one corner of the clearing? Throats slit and heaped into a pile? What about the numerous axes she could see twinkling like stars on the belts of these people? Or, you know, how they started to unsheathe those weapons as the man became airborne. Yeah, that last one was a real good reason to begin running.

The was a whistle of wind as green-eyed man descended, a harsh thud as he jarringly landed on his side, a slush and chug as he skidded in the muck and sludge, doing a little spin Harry would have found hilarious if the circumstances were different. Then, only as his body came to a tittering stop, was there a sharp, high pitched cry from the crowd. Harry winced.

A small body disengaged from the mass of bodies congregated together, offering protection in numbers and density, a trail of curly, sunny blonde hair trailing behind her blundering and leaping body as she dashed for the man, skidding harshly on her knees as she huddled over him. The woman curved her body further around his limp form, grabbing him by the shoulders and shaking him. Shit. Harry must have knocked him unconscious. The hit wasn't strong enough to equal death… Unless there had been a rock hiding in the mud that he had cracked his head on. Still, the woman carried on shaking him, speaking in a spiking, harsh and rolling language that gave Harry a poignant sense of Déjà vu, volume growing louder in what Harry would guess was alarm. Right, well, that would be her signal. Harry's thighs began to tense in preparation for her to bolt it into the treeline and away from the armed crowd of likely pissed ritual goers.

However, just as her foot began to lift, the blonde woman's head turned sharply, eyes wide, mouth agape as she came to stare at Harry. The world span and then sickeningly stopped, Harry's eyes zeroed in on the woman's face and the people, the man, the dead body behind her, the priest, it was all forgotten. No clearing. No blood. No mob of armed muggles. No heartbeat. Nothing but that face. The face that was looking at her so scared, shocked, confused, lonely in its glowing presence in a wave of confusion that struck Harry in the sternum.

Those dreams, the nightmares, the dusty, abandoned turns of unconscious mind clouded Harry's eyes like a rolling fog, seeping into her pores and very being. In so much clarity, she could recall them, live them again, be there when she never could before. She was no longer in the clearing, no longer Harry, but something… Other, nameless, shapeless, lost in dreams she had not ever known she had been having.

She saw that woman's face, smiling from ear to ear in front of her, dressed in a soft yellow dress. She was bent on her haunches, arms outstretched as if waiting for a hug, fingers flexing in a come-hither motion. Her words, they were too soft to distinguish, but Harry knew she was cheering her on. The image tilted to one side, then the other, as if it was rocking and it was only as Harry looked down that she realised she was waddling on baby legs to the woman's warm embrace. When she looked up, a toothless giggle erupted from her chest.

She saw that woman's face laughing, crinkled in such a good way, eyes twinkling as she… Helga, yes, Helga, bent down and picked her up from the forest floor, spinning her in arching circles. The stones that had previously fascinated her young mind were long forgotten as the wind rustled through her short, cropped hair, more giggles spewing forth. A shadow loomed behind Helga but then it took shape… The green eyed man she had sent flying was behind her, wrapping an arm around Helga's slender shoulders, huddling them both to his side as he peered down at Harry. He grinned, all sharp fang and curling lip, a smile Harry would later have, as he pushed forth one spindly finger and bopped her on the nose. He went to do it again, but Harry's own hand grasped his finger, her own too short to wrap around more than one of his, knuckles indented and chubby. She leant forward and bit the finger… The man only laughed louder.

She saw that woman's face, content and peaceful, leaning over her bed as Harry fidgeted in the layers of fur, itching to get up and cause havoc. There was so much to see, so much to do, so much to play, she couldn't sleep now! Still, Helga wrestled her into her clothe and fur prison, stroking her growing curls away from her face with gentle, motherly hands. Hands Harry had never felt before… But she had. Hadn't she? She felt them now. Green eyed man peeked out from over Helga's shoulder, pulling faces that bubbled more laughter within her chest. Helga took a swipe at him, but she couldn't hide her own laughter.

She saw that woman's face etched with worry, lines as harsh and cold as the craggy stones of the little beach they were standing at the edge of. Helga stood beside her, Harry barely pipping her kneecap in size. Helga was holding her hand, giant compared to her own, with the hint of callouses dampening the softness of the limp. They both stood staring out at the beach, to the man upon it… Green eyed-… No, Floki… That's right, she remembered, Floki, as he whittled and sliced great planks of wood. The chop, thunk, chop, thunk, chop, thunk, reminded Harry of her own heartbeat. The skeletons of half-formed ships were littering the beaches tide edge like a grand graveyard for a sunken amarda. Harry tugged on Helga's hand urgently.

"faðir play?"

Helga only looked more worried as she bent down to her, picking her up and beginning the arduous walk home. Floki was soon nothing but a spit of frantic colour and movement as they scaled the winding path back to the hut, and still, Harry stared and stared and stared.

"Not today elskan mín (my love). Perhaps tomorrow."

She saw that woman's face doused in absolute fear, sour and rancid, as it hovered above her bedroll near the window, bed furs and clothes stripped, bathed in pale silver light as she laid naked under the open window with the high moon bearing down upon her frail body. There were no stars that night, and for some strange reason, Harry remembered that most. The confusion. Where had all the stars gone? Something wet and cold slipped across her forehead, rivets of icy water trickling down her face, temples and gliding into her hairline as little Harry quaked and shook. Hot. Too hot. Harry… But not Harry, that was wrong… That wasn't her name… What was her name again? Alice? Anne? Angie? Ang…

She couldn't remember, but she knew she was ill. So very, very, very ill. Her blood was on fire, bones like hot glass, melting and twisting underneath her skin, eyes parched to dust, flesh crisping and drying like the fish that Helga pinned up above the smoke spit, cracking and blackening. There was a loud pop as Helga threw the clothe down into the bowl besides them, proceeding to bundle her up in thin clothe and then carried her from the woodland hut. Away from home. Where were all the stars? No, not the stars. They were in the sky, she knew that. She wasn't looking for the stars, she was looking for Floki and yet, he was nowhere to be found. Helga was cursing him as she began to pick up her speed as Harry but not Harry's breath began to faulter.

She remembered that woman's face, wrathful and resistant. Angr-… Harry but not Harry was laid down on a table… In the very clearing she had tumbled into when she was Harry. The same priest was splashing her with strange substances, all vermillion red and yellow ochre, chanting and croaking. Nothing was working, it was getting harder to breath. The cloying dark grey smoke he blew into her face from a bundle of herbs only made her cough up blood. The priest shook his head. Helga flooded with tears, scrambling to wrench her into her quaking arms, stroking her tangled and sweat dripping hair. Where was fa-… Floki? One breath, two breaths… No breaths. Gone. She was dead again. _It's just like going to sleep._

She remembered that woman's face riddled with grief as Helga was dragged away from her body, the priest going to prepare her for burial. Only… She wasn't dead, not really. She came back, spluttering and wheezing. But the priest didn't care, didn't mind… There was another body beside her on the table now, as naked as she was. Dumbledore, he was there, in the shadows. He slithered out from the darkness like a great spider who had felt the pluck of thread on his web, picked her up, forced something foul down her throat, waved a stick in front of the priest's face, and began to take her into the woods, far away. Her bones felt funny, her skin too, shrinking and morphing and gaining the fat she had shaken off. Smaller and smaller she grew, less mobile, her head felt big and fat like the moon above them. De-aging potion.

She couldn't fight, she was still too weak, to hot, too tired. She did, however, get a glimpse of the priest again as they turned around a large oak tree, as he began to wrap the other body on the table where she had been. Her ashen, dead and open-eyed corpse stared back at her. But it wasn't her on that table, it was a fake, sticks and stones and mirages. A wizarding parody of her. There was a whisper on the wind, a sharp pull in her gut and she was gone.

Somehow, someway, she just knew somewhere here, a couple, a boy, somebody, had found Luna's own counterfeit body, floating along a stream, the real Luna tucked away with Dumbledore like Harry.

She didn't remember the next face, how could she? She was in another world... Another time. Stolen and mind overlapped with false memories. But she saw it. Resigned and melancholy as Helga and a man she did not know laid a wrapped body in a shallow grave. Harry but not Harry stood on the edge of the pit, staring down at the mockery. She screamed at the woman, at Helga, she screamed and cried and pulled and yanked at her hair, but they did not listen. They could not hear her. That body, it wasn't her. It was fake. Made by the flicks and twists of a wizard's hand. She was here. Right here! Look at her! She was here! She was alive! Just fucking look at her! Find her! They didn't and soon, the dirt was being draped over the forgery like a blanket, as if tucking it into eternal rest. But there was no rest, not for the real Angrb-… There had been war, blood, real death and insurmountable loss.

Harry, if she was even her now, stumbled. Her mind back in the clearing, staring dead straight at the woman… Helga, but not Helga, no, Helga held a different name to her. Something bright flickered in the depths of the woman's eyes, she shook violently as she stood, eyes never leaving Harry, oh how that name felt wrong now, head cocking to the side just a fraction as she stumbled towards her, one lone hand trembling as it rose as if to grab her. Harry felt something hot and slick leak down her cheeks. The tears mingled with the blood on her face, tinging them pink. All salt and iron, like the great sea. Helga spoke the name that Harry could not remember, and the nightmares… Dreams, no, memories came flooding back.

"Angrboða?"

Her voice, when she was finally able to speak, sounded rough, like the lapping of an evening tide on a giant rock pool.

"Mum… Móðir?"

Harry took a step forward, but that was all she was able to take as spindly fingers wrapped around her eyes, cold, clammy breath fluttering across the shell of her ear. She only got a glance at the man… Thing that had crept up behind her. Black cloak, pale white skin, blackened teeth and lips, with no eyes. Just skin, wrinkled and taunt laying over the sockets. Her magic screamed deafeningly inside of her. _Run. Not human. Old. Run!_

"Sleep Angrboða."

Harry fell to the floor unconscious like a puppet that had their strings cut. For once in her short life, there were no nightmares.

* * *

 **AN:** Well, this has been a long time coming, hasn't it? I'm incredibly sorry for the long wait, university is a lot harder than I gave it credit for and the first year is nothing but a blur XD. However, I'm on summer break now, and what better way to relax than to update this fic?

I know a lot of you will have questions after this chapter, but the answers will come in time, I just wanted to start setting up things for future chapters, so please be patient!

I always hated what happened to little Angrboða and Siggy Jr in Vikings, as it would have been a brilliant chance to explore what female Vikings went through while growing up in such an environment, instead they got killed off (in quite stupid ways if you ask me) :/. Still, we have fanfiction! So, I've decided to meddle a little bit lol. Just hold of judgement for a little while, not everything is clear yet XD.

I know this chapter was short, but the next one should be out late this week, Sunday, or early next, Monday, Tuesday. So there shouldn't be too much of a wait!

 **THANK YOU ALL** to those who followed, favourited and reviewed! Like, wow, I really wasn't expecting the reaction this fic got, especially seen as it was sprung by an errant plot bunny and the Viking fandom on FF is not that big. Still, you all have my huge gratitude and I hope you enjoyed this chapter! If anyone has any questions, don't hesitate to ask!

 _ **Please leave a review**_ , you never know, the chapters may drop faster XD.

 **~carelessdodger.**


	3. Blood soaked hands

_**WARNINGS:**_ Heavy profanity use in this chapter.

* * *

The first thing to hit Harry was the smell. All burnt feathers, raw fish and rotting wood. Subconsciously, her hand came up to scrub at her nose, groaning at the smell. Only then, as the sound stalled, did she notice the hushed and rapidly speaking voices. Blinking like a new-born fawn taking its first glimpse at the world, Harry took in her surroundings from her sprawled form on the floor. Nets and strings dangled across the ceiling, knotted with charred bones and singed feathers, dead chickens, necks snapped grotesquely lining one wall.

There was a hole in the middle of the small, grey hut, likely a firepit by the ash still inside, half burned, yellow candles where stuck to the floor, dropping and caking the rickety floor in sticky wax. The lone window, the one Harry had been lain down under, was barred with thick reeds, making dramatic rectangle lighting splinter across the room in slices of contrary yellow. However, as Harry's neck craned to get a better look, wincing at the ache and confusion, did the people in the room begin to form faces when her vision cleared.

In the corner was the thing, ancient, bent, sitting on a barrel, draped in black and chanting as it threw carven bones onto a little table by its side, mmming and ahing at whatever it saw. It picked through the shiny pebbles and bones like a vulture did with meat from bone. In the other corner stood a pair. A woman, braided blonde, undeniably beautiful, holding the arm of a man nearly twice her size. The man was gruff looking, blonde too, head partially shaven with a fine beard descending his neck, the brown fur cloak he had perched over his shoulders making him look all the more like a bear than his grizzly appearance did.

There was a lone woman, tall and regal, glistening red hair blowing in the breeze from the open door, in which she stayed trapped between room and outside, hands folded in front of her and looking for all her worth like she was holding court. Her bejewelled dress and fine, willowy figure could point her out as pureblood, if she was a witch, that is. The last couple she knew, they stood by the fire pit, opposite Harry but on the wrong side of the pit, huddled and whispering to each other, throwing her glances every few seconds. Floki and Helga. However, it was the last inhabitant that caught and held her attention.

"Luna?"

She was a few feet in front of her, on her side of the fire pit, the only one brave enough to come so close, playing with the blue woolen dress she had changed into. Harry cut a glance down to herself and found her jeans and T-shirt gone, blood too, replaced by a long, thin shirt and a pair of baggy leather breeches, feet bare and toes tingling from the cold. Luna cast her a smile, eyes twinkling, shoulders lax and manner easy as she folded her legs and peered at a haggard Harry. Mother fucker looked right at home.

"Hey, Harry."

Harry sat up, wincing when the world span around her, rubbing at her temple as she glared at Luna. Hey? Hey?! There was so much she wanted to say to her, to ask her, to shout at her, and yet she found them all flooding away from her tongue. What the hell was going on? What was she thinking? No. Luna hadn't been thinking or she wouldn't have bloody thrown them both through a fucking portal! Still, no matter having been jumped by the woman, or wondering how long she'd been out of the count for, she was still worried for her friend, even if she didn't want to be.

"Hey Harry? That's all you've got? Where the hell have you been?"

Of course, her tone didn't exactly say worried, more of bellowed an on coming shit storm Harry was about to release on a cheery Luna. Then again, Harry had never been good at expressing her emotions. The last time someone had told her they loved her, Ginny, Harry had just hummed and then booted it from the room, dodging the girl until she got the hint. Not a classy way to let someone down, but it had done the job. Luna, though, seemed as if she understood perfectly and smiled brighter. The urge to punch her in the face only grew tenfold. Especially when her voice practically sang her next words.

"I fell through and into a stream, on the way back from their ritual, carrying you in a hay cart, they stumbled across me. I'm guessing it's where I 'died' before. I heard you dropped into hof ground, where you 'died' before? Interesting… It seems we appeared were we were taken from… Why are you frowning? Oh, hof is the word for their holy temples and land…"

Harry didn't like the way Luna emphasized the word died with a cheeky grin and quotation marks with her fingers. Harry stumbled as she stood, a bit shaky on her feet. Whatever uncle fester had done to her had not fully worn off, and surrounded by people she didn't know, those memories she could still recall not counting, made her irrevocably uncomfortable. No. There was no time to mull over hazy dreams or memories, she needed to get her head into the game. She reached for her wand on instinct and came up blank, frowning deeper when she patted herself and found no wand what-so-ever. She went to speak as she took a few steps forward but something invisible bounced her back a step.

Harry scowled, hand shaking as she reached out and prodded. Yes. There really was something there. Standing up now, she could see the floor and her scowl turned murderous. Intricate runes in a curving spirals decorated the floor in blood… Chicken likely, in a circle. A circle she was trapped in and just outside of the perimeters sat Luna bloody Lovegood smiling.

"A witch's seal? Luna… Let. Me. Out. Now."

It was archaic, witch's seals, used before the time of wards. Old hearth magic, replaced because witches seals dampened all magic used within said seal, where wards allowed the inhabitant to do what they wanted. Rumour had it they were still used in Azkaban cells to stop wandless magic, but Harry didn't know for sure. Because the things were so old and hardly ever used anymore, there was no known way to escape one without having an outsider destroy one of the runes. So, not only was she wandless, she was now also diminished in wandless magic in a foreign place. Fan-fucking-tastic.

"I can't do that Harry. I know what you're like. You're confused and angry, and when you're like this you fall back onto fighting and there's no one here to fight."

Harry would beg to differ. There was that old thing in the corner, these bastards in the room who, especially bear man, she remembered unsheathing their axes ready to lunge at her, and with the smile on Luna's face, Harry was going to add her to the list of people she needed to kick in the head.

"Really now? No one? Because I'm not fucking confused about waking up upon a dead fucking body with those bastards behind you readying their axes for my neck!"

Luna sighed dreamily, dusting her hands off on her knees before she stood.

"Harry-"

Oh, no. No way in hell was she going to let Luna cut her off. Not when all this was the blonde's fault in the first place.

"And I'm definitely not fucking confused about you luring me into a trap and then throwing me through a bloody portal!"

Luna gave her a sad smile when Harry angrily jabbed a finger in her direction, the witch's seal zapping her finger when it felt her anger. It only made her snarl and step threateningly closer to the edge, daring Luna to come closer.

"You don't understand what's happening-"

Harry's fists balled up at her sides, her back bending a little to look at Luna eye level. This close, Harry's lanky frame dwarfed the blonde, her shadow eating hers whole as she bared down upon her. Her curls, loose and tangled with amber leaves and brown twigs, slipped over her shoulder and engulfed her face in crimson flames, making her look crazed and half animal, mane alive and shadowing her keen eyes.

"Oh, I have a good bloody clue, thank you! Somehow, someway, you've decided to play god and jump us through realms or dimensions and put us into the body of dead people. Well, good bloody job Luna! Not only have you trapped us in medieval cannibal land, I'm now having fucking flashes of memories that are not mine and –"

It was the first time since she had met Luna that she saw actual anger seep out of the blonde. To be frank, it was a tad terrifying. Luna's eyes squinted, her jaw clenched, and her bright, shiny eyes grew dark and sharp, hooded by her heavy, pale brow. Her words were clipped, tone heavy and oppressive like a thunder cloud right above Harry's head.

"Listen to me!"

Harry refused to pull away from the edge of the circle she was trapped in, her pride refused that much, but her wrathful tongue did lull. When Luna saw she had Harry's attention and she wasn't going to interrupt the blonde again, Luna eased, her face flattening into that smile, as if the anger had never been there. The change was dizzying, as if Harry had all of a suddenly been plunked into a brightly lit room from a dank cell.

"We didn't jump dimensions. I haven't placed us in bodies not our own. Look at me! Do I have a face not my own?"

Harry gave her a searching look. There was the white hair, long and wavy. There was the spacey eyes, lost and unfocused half the time. There was that permanent up twist to the corners of her lips that forever made her look like she was day dreaming and right there, on one cheek, was the dimple she always had. Nope, it was definitely Luna… Radish earing and everything. Then what the hell was going on? She was Harriet bloody Potter, why was she having these 'memories' of Angrboða, of being Angrboða, if she hadn't been pushed into their body? Why did that name feel right? Luna spoke again, as if she knew exactly what Harry was thinking.

"You know the truth Angrboða. You just won't admit it."

No. If this wasn't some bleed over from her possessing a body… No. It was a trick. The 'memories' were fake. Harry knew who she was. Luna was playing some sick fucking game and Harry wanted no part in it. Snapping, Harry punch the invisible boarder that separated them, wishing her knuckles met flesh and bone rather than a stagnant force field that electrocuted her, though she did not show so through her anger taking over.

"Don't bloody call me that! My name is Harry!"

Luna smiled larger, cocking her head, hitting back.

"It may be now, but it hasn't always been so."

Harry huffed and pushed away from the edge of the circle, opening her arms wide, even when she wanted to pull her hair out at the roots from frustration.

"You never make any fucking sense! Just let me out or I swear to Merlin, I will fucking skin your face off and make that ginger one over there eat it. See how fucking regal she looks then with a bit of your bloody nose trapped between her teeth!"

Harry jerked her head in the direction of the red head woman, smiling as she did so. From the corner of her eye, she saw the woman's reaction. Her shoulders stiffened, her legs locked and the soft blush that she had been sporting from the chilly weather bleached white. If Harry wasn't so angry about being trapped, she would have started to question whether they could understand her. But no, that was impossible. Harry didn't know their language, dammit, she didn't even know what time or place she was in and she knew she was speaking English. However, Luna understood her and, of course, her own anger came flaring back to life, battering against Harry's own raging one.

"I'll let you out when you actually start listening!"

"I'll listen when you decide to speak some sense!"

Stale mate. Luna pulled away from her, balancing precariously on the edge of the fire pit, heels dangling over the edge, giving them both as much space as the small hut allowed them to. Whether it was from trying to tamper her own anger, or to get away from Harry's blistering stare and heat, Harry didn't know, she only felt more bitter that Luna obviously had the choice to move around and she didn't. Why did these fuckers trust Luna and not her? Granted, Harry had sent some of them flying and she doubted Luna had reacted the same to them as she had, but come the bloody hell on! There was six of them and one of her, sure she had magic on her side, but they had daggers and axes, never mind bear mans sheer size and obvious strength.

Harry hated feeling trapped, loathed it, detested it, and Luna knew that. The blonde was obviously trying to get into her head, and ruefully Harry would admit, it was working. Harry's heart began to stutter in a pounding rhythm, her breath becoming sharp, tilting jolts as she circled around her invisible cage, restless and prowling. Luna took pity on her darting eyes, or began to think of the repercussions of what would happen when Harry got out, because she would eventually, it was just a matter of time, and even Luna couldn't be optimistic enough not to know Harry wouldn't gun for her as soon as the seal broke.

"It's all about the blood Harry, it always has been."

"Here we go…"

Luna's voice was soft, serious, but still somehow managing to keep that feathery tone of etherealness. Harry would start by cutting that bloody tongue from her mouth. Rolling her eyes, Harry went to turn her back to Luna, non-verbally putting a stop to the conversation, but the blonde leapt into action. Storming around the firepit, she plucked up Floki and Helga's arms, unceremoniously dragged them over and then pushed them forward, towards Harry, just enough for her to get a good look at them from the little lighting Harry had but keeping them just far enough away from the seals edge. Of course, the seal wouldn't work on them, being muggle and all that jazz, but that didn't mean Harry wouldn't nab one if the option came up and use them as a hostage to get the fuck out of the seal. Shit, Luna knew her better than Harry had ever known.

"These are your parents. Your name is Angrboða and this is where we were born."

Harry's arms crossed over her chest, her hip cocking as her head tilted to the side, blinking wearily as she eyed Luna up and down. There was no need for further discussion, Luna had lost her mind. End of story. She was dealing with a whacked out baby seer.

"Have you hit your head? My parents were James and Lily Potter, I fucking visited their graves! I fought Voldemort and his deatheaters because of my parentage! Do you not see the bloody scar on my forehead? Do I need to show you the ones littering my body too, to jog your memory? You've lost your mind…"

Credit due to Helga and Floki, they didn't step away or back off, even if they didn't understand her words, her tone was as clear as a church bell ringing on a crisp Sunday morn. They were all treading on thin ice. Luna sighed and peered up at Harry from her lashes, face melancholic and pitiful, as if she was about to tell her she had a terminal illness. Something hot sank in her gut, twisting her abdomen painfully.

"No, you fought Voldemort and his followers because the real Harriet Potter died in the attack that killed Lily and James Potter. I fought the deatheaters because the real Luna died in the explosion that killed her mother."

Harry stormed the edge of the seal and pushed against the barrier, growling as the force grew in pushing her back. Red sparks began to crackle in the air, fizzling and sizzling in the coldness, bright and dangerous. Floki and Helga, seeing the magic right in front of them, grimaced but did not step away, especially as Harry's hands began to tingle, bleed and burn from pushing against the seal. Just as there was a tear appearing in the seal that kept her at bay, highlighted by the crackling red lightning, as Helga went to rush for her, worry marring her face horridly as blood began to trickle down her smoking hands and soak the sleeves of her shirt, held back by Floki, the pain became too much and Harry let out a war cry and fell back. Hissing and shaking her hands, little plumes of smoke rising from her blackened fingers, Harry began to yell.

"You've completely lost it, haven't you?! The last scraps of sanity you had are nothing but fucking dust in the wind!"

The world span, her burnt fingers curled and more blood seeped. However, the pain kept her in the present, away from those dreams or fake memories that had plagued her in the clearing, so she pressed her nails into the palm of her hand until pain zinged up her wrist and elbow. They weren't real. They couldn't be. She was Harriet Potter, she knew who she was! Luna saw her crumbling and brought Helga closer, keeping a safe arm around her elbow, shy of just a step away from the edge of Harry's prison.

"Look at her! Look at her and then look me in the eye and say you don't remember anything. That she is but a stranger."

No. She wouldn't look. Lies. Fucking lies. Still, Harry's teeth ground together, her jaw clenched and against what her mind was screaming at her to do, her eyes locked onto Helga's. Those memories in the clearing where still fresh, seeping and sore, like an open wound, and it felt like, as she pondered upon Helga's face, more were flooding in. She knew, back in the woodland hut, there was a doll crammed down near her old bed, made from hay and wool, lovingly stitched by her mother. It had been her favourite doll. It still had some stains on its face from when Angrboða had accidently shoved it into some dough and it had been baked into a loaf of bread.

She knew, somewhere near that woodland hut was a special tree. It drooped, branches spindly and viney, like ropes of leaves. Its shade was thick and the ground around it was dead, lifeless, but it was her favourite tree. It was where Floki had taught her to climb. They would sit at its trunk, ears pressed to the bark and her father would tell her to listen, hear the voice, see the roots and she could. She could hear them loud and clear and Odin, how they sang.

She knew there was a certain path in Kattegat, narrow and muddy in which she used to run down, laughing manically as she pulled along a little cart behind her, a small boy around her age sitting inside, both choking on laughter as they knocked people over in their hast to scramble down the winding path. It was always funny when the tall ones fell, they looked so undignified with their long limbs flailing. Oh, she fucking knew alright, she just didn't know _how_ she bloody knew those things.

"I-… It isn't-…"

Harry hadn't realised she had spoke until Luna answered back.

"You can't, can you?"

Harry forced her eyes away from Helga, staring resolutely down at the wonky flooring. She was Harriet Potter… Wasn't she?

"Please, Luna… Start at the beginning."

Luna began to speak as if she was whittling off a recipe, all factual and no nonsense. It felt jarring with what she was actually saying. In that space, trapped, mind jumbled, nothing felt factual. Nothing felt real.

"Everything is how you remember. Lily and James Potter died in Godric's hollow on Allhallows eve in 1981, protecting Harriet Potter. Only, Harriet died too. Dumbledore knew the war couldn't be won without her, and he tried everything he could to stop it from happening. Only, nothing worked. Destiny had spoken, Harriet Potter would die that night. There was no changing that."

Harry shook her head violently, turning her gaze to the window, her side placed towards Luna and face hidden.

"But I'm Harriet Potter and I'm pretty sure I'm still alive."

Then, with six words, just six, Harry's world came crashing down upon her.

"He had a time turner Harry."

Just six words, used separately, they would have meant nothing. But together? They meant everything. Harry's head snapped back around so fast her neck twanged, eyes wide as she slowly shook her head, curls dancing.

"No… No! You are not saying what I think you're saying…"

Dumbledore had a time turner. A. Time. Turner. The fake memories… Not so fake. Her life… Not quite hers. Her destiny… Meant for someone else… Her pain… Not truly hers to feel… She felt sick. Twisted. She could taste blood. Luna carried on as if nothing was amiss.

"He tried everything. He kept replaying the day over, and over, and over. Nothing worked. Polyjuice potion, his own presence in the home, moving them, hiding Harriet, pre-emptive attack on Voldemort, deserting England with Harriet in toe… It all ended the same way. The death of a new born and the loss of the war. I think it drove him a bit mad."

She couldn't speak, she could barely get those two words out.

"Then… How?"

Luna's eyes rolled to the ceiling, dancing left and right as if she was seeing something no one else could. No doubt, she actually was.

"Harriet Potter needed to die, destiny needed its pound of Potter flesh, but it's all about the blood. Don't you see Harry? Fate needed a Potter to die, but they also needed one to live and fight. The Potter's where the last of their line, there were no cousins or distant relatives to take up the mantle… But there was a time turner…"

 _Clink._ The pieces fell into place and Harry found herself finishing off what Luna had started.

"There had been no Potter left in that time, but there were ones previously… Dumbledore tracked the family ancestry…"

Luna's eyes darted back to her as a grin blossomed on her face. She took a step forward, toe threatening to cross the border of the seal, yet, she stalled herself just in time, dampening her excitement.

"Yes! He tracked it back to you! To Angrboða! To Floki's line, the first ancestors that started to display magic as we know it."

Harry scrubbed at her eyes and began to pace. Three steps right, sharp turn, three steps left, the span of her cage, sharp turn, repeat. It still didn't make sense…

"So, what? He time travelled, took their Angrboða, and what? Killed her off so the 'blood' would be paid? So it left me free to fight the war? Is that why I have these memories? I'm being haunted by a dead child?"

Luna began to freak, tapping at her temples harshly as she shook her head violently.

"No, no, no! Harriet needed to die, not Angrboða!"

She stopped the action to stare bottomlessly at Harry, voice muted and hushed.

"He came back, yes. But Angrboða was older, too old to be a new born and with the time turner he had, he could not travel any further back than he already had. It was amazing he made it this far back to begin with! A bit of de-aging potion fixed that problem and then it was just a small case of spelling a dead dear to resemble you for Helga and Floki to grieve over so there would be no questions. He took you back to the wizarding world, swapped Harriet with you on the night of the attack and the rest… Well, you know the rest."

No, Harry didn't. She didn't think she knew anything anymore. So, Harriet was born to die, so Dumbledore had tracked their… Hers… The real Harriet's ancestry back to her? Faked her death and brought her to the wizarding world, swapping children? She wasn't born to die that night, so when Voldemort attacked, she could have lived through it. Lily's sacrifice only cemented her survival… Only, Lily had likely thought she was sacrificing herself for her own child… Not one stolen and replaced… Her sacrifice meant nothing… She… Her and James… She was going to vomit.

"What happened to Harriet… The real one? And why did I not remember anything until I landed in that clearing? If this is fact, I should have kept my memories. De-aging potion doesn't strip your mind from you."

Harry, or was it Angrboða, stumbled, nearly falling to her knees as she spoke, unsteady and whirling. She managed to keep herself upright, not noticing Floki had went to steady her with a hand, but was evidently stopped by Luna. Harry swallowed reflexively, blinking rapidly as her mind was assaulted with more memories, so lost she nearly didn't hear Luna.

"Harriet died in an orphanage on the same night of the attack of fever. Don't grimace Harry. She was always meant to die. Some people just are. As for the memories, he destroyed some, you'll never get your full memories back. But others, the things you're beginning to remember? They were too deeply rooted to destroy, if he had of tried, he would have melted your mind to goop. That wouldn't be good for what he planned for you to accomplish, so, he locked them away. However, the process of accessing those memories again isn't a pleasant one, it's why you feel dizzy, why your nose is bleeding. Don't fight it or you'll damage your mind…"

Luna's words were scattered, overlapping, disjointed to Harry, but she did run her burnt fingers under her nose, pulling them away and saw the blood. It blended into the crimson already decorating her hands.

"But, I'm Harriet Potter-… I've always been-… I'm-…"

The world jolted, like two images not quite laying over one another, her hand turned to two, fuzzy and quaking. She was seeing double, she couldn't think straight, she couldn't breath… Was Luna still speaking? Did she speak? Where was she? Who was she?

"And you are… In a way. You lived what you have. But you are also Angrboða. These two are your parents. You were born here, like me. I'm Luna, but I'm also Siggy. Them, there, that's my father and grandmother."

Harry's eyes crunched shut tightly as she harshly wiped at them. Breathe. In. Out. In. Out. Don't fight. That's what Luna said, wasn't it? Don't fight, just breathe. After a few moments, the world stopped spinning, but her mind still felt like shattered glass digging into her conscious thought. Looking up, she could see Luna pointing to the blonde woman and bear man. Having attention brought to them, the bear man nodded once and the blonde woman gave Harry a bright smile, a lot like Luna's smile actually. Fuck? That was her grandmother? She barely looked old enough to have kids of her own. Talk about lucking out in the genetic gene pool. Wait, she shouldn't be focusing on that… Still… Luna… Why Luna?

"You… I understand, sort of, what he did to me if it meant winning the war, but why you too? Why do it to the both of us?"

Luna's face fell a little.

"I.. I actually don't know."

Bloody seers. Good at dictating other's futures, absolutely shite at forecasting and assessing their own.

"I do. I would have died without you or given up. I was planning on running, you know? Running and never looking back after Sirius died. You're the one who found me and gave me strength again. You're the one who amassed Dumbledore's army when the school was taken over and I was on the run. You're the one who taught me that death isn't the end. Without you, I would have failed. Either Dumbledore played with his time turner longer than what you know of, or he had always known. The war needed you as much as it needed me."

Luna gave a noncommittal shrug, as if being abducted from her own time and thrown into a war of their descendants meant it was just another Tuesday, and she was more focused on the shepherd's pie they were having for lunch than full scale time alteration.

"Perhaps. But, I suppose, we'll never really know."

Nonetheless, Luna may be happy to live on in the shady space of uncertainty, Harry certainly was not. If she were to believe all that Luna was telling her, she needed the answers. All of them.

"Speaking of, how did you know about all this? If Dumbledore fucked with my head, he must have with you too. Why am I remembering now and not before?"

Once again, there was that damned shrug.

"I'm good at divination. He tried to wipe my memories, but it was more poorly done with me than it was with you. It's hard to scrub away someone's past when they can see your future. I've dreamt this, you know? This exact conversation, and many more versions of it. It was easier for me to fit the pieces together-"

Harry cut her off. She couldn't help it. Ever since Sirius and the ministry of magic, Harry held an inherent distrust of prophetic notions and seer-hood. The last time she believed in a vision from the future, Sirius had died. Who would pay the price this time? She had quickly run out of friends to kill, and if all this was really just Luna confused, she had no family to kill off.

"What if you're wrong? Wrong about all this? Look at Trelawney, divination can't be trusted. We forge our own paths and-"

"You know I'm not wrong Harry."

Harry clicked her tongue against the back of her teeth in agitation, fingers clenching once more. Pain was good. Pain was real. That was something she needed in this fucked up world she had found herself in. Luna simply reached up and flicked a feather, watching it swing back and forth as she carried on.

"The reason you're remembering now is because he locked them away, but his death degraded that seal. You've been having these dreams for a while now, haven't you? You're minds strong. It would have broken through eventually. I just… Gave it a little nudge."

Then, like a dam breaking, all of Harry's worries and bittersweet anger at this whole situation brokered forth like a tsunami.

"Why bring us back? They thought we were dead. The war was over. We could have built a life in the wizarding world. We could have helped others. Aren't we messing up the future by being here? Are we creating a world where Voldemort wins?"

And, it is here, we find Harry's true reason for her weariness and dread. What if, by being here, Voldemort would resurrect? What if they changed time, somehow, and he achieved immortality? All that death, all that pain, all those sacrifices, nothing. None of it would mean a damn thing. All that Harry had been through would be invalid. She would have no reason. No point.

"We could have, yes. But would you have been happy? It wasn't our time Harry. It wasn't our land. It wasn't our people. It wasn't our family. That's what you've always wanted, isn't it? Family and home? I know I have."

Harry exploded, storming right back to the edge of the seal, snarling and yapping.

"But not for the price of letting Voldemort win! For damning innocent people! I don't care about Dumbledore. I don't give a flying fuck about the ministry. I couldn't care less about the Malfoys or the wizarding world… But Hermione, Ron, Neville? Their blood will be on our hands. Sirius, Remus, Tonks, Fred, Dobby, Snape, their deaths would mean nothing! My death would mean nothing!"

Yet again, Harry's blow was met with equal measure and fire.

"We've damned no one! What is done, is done. You defeated Voldemort. That will not change. If I had of time travelled and killed Dumbledore before he could take us, perhaps Voldemort would have rose. But I didn't. I simply took us after the war had been won. Floki's cousin's, in a few generations, will birth the Potter line, Lagertha's own ones will seed the Lovegood's and what is to come will play out as it had before. Siggy and Angrboða will take the place of Harriet and Luna. I've only given Angrboða and Siggy a life they had been denied by a man who played people like they were chess pieces! A life we both deserve! Don't stand there and fucking lie to me about being happy in the wizarding world and-"

"We could have been happy in the wizarding world if you hadn't of decided to become Dumbledore and mess with people without their consent! If we had of tried, we could-"

Luna, Harry was coming to realize, was good at stopping people in their tracks with minimal words used.

"You would die."

Harry blinked once, head inching closer as if she had not heard correctly.

"What?"

Luna sagged like a dying sunflower, head drooping and petals falling.

"The Wizengamot doesn't like loose ends, especially remainders of a great war. Last night, if we had of stayed in the wizarding world, you would have been poisoned at the annual victory peace festival. It would have been a slow and painful death, one blamed on a loose deatheater, and used by the MoM to cement the peace they thought they earned. The great hero died for us, now we have to carry on with what they died for. They would have manipulated your image, who you were to fit their agenda, using your name as a rallying cry. People would have mourned, but by the years end, you would have been nothing but a face for martyrdom. A tragedy of justice to tell the younger generations to keep them in line. I too would have died, in my bed, suffocated with a choking spell because I would have witnessed your poisoning. The fact that were alive now means fate hasn't written our ending in stone like it had done the original Luna and Harriet. It means we're on the right path or last night, we would have died."

What was Harry meant to say to that? It was too much. All this, the ministry, Luna, memories, it was all too fucking much.

"You… You saw that?"

Luna nodded and picked at the sleeve of her dress.

"I saw many things, but all equalled death for you and me if we stayed."

Harry shook her head. No. Be that as it may, there was always more options. France. Bulgaria. The bloody artic, not time travel. Never time travel. Even if it was to come back to the time they had been taken from.

"There were still other places to go! Not here. Not with us playing ghosts! Think of what you're putting them through! Giving them hope that their children are alive, and alive we may be, but we are not as they remember! I was bloody willing to kill Floki in that clearing! They'll see that eventually and they'll come to loath us for it. We'll loath them too! So… Fix it. Say sorry and then send us back. You brought us here, you can reverse it!"

They could still fix this. No one needed to get hurt. Because they would. Merlin knows they would. Look at Harry's track record, everything she had ever loved, cared for, had died. They would too. It was how it went with Harry. She would get to know them, she would begin to care, perhaps love them, and then boom. Gone. All rotten flesh and jagged bone. It was her curse.

"There is no way back! The spell I used is a one-way journey! This is all you've ever wanted! A home! A family that will love you! Why are you so angry about this!? Why can't you be happy for once!?"

Of course, Luna wouldn't understand. No one ever did. She didn't distance herself, keep herself away, shy away from happiness because she wanted to, she did so because it protected those around her. Fate hated seeing her happy and bad times always came when she smiled.

Look at everything she had caused. Sirius, Dobby, Snape, Remus, Tonks, Fred, their deaths were on her hands. And so many more, some faceless, some children, Merlin, she was a walking plague. Why could no one ever see that? Sorrow was her life, death was her home and loneliness was her shelter. Happiness belonged to mad men and children, and unfortunately, she was neither.

"Because I don't deserve it!"

Once Harry had started, she couldn't stop, the words came before she could think of them clearly.

"Nothing ever good comes from happy things! Not in my life! I don't get to be happy! I'm Harry the martyr. I'm Harry the slayer. Dammit, I'm Harry the blood-soaked! Not Angrboða the daughter, or Angrboða the peaceful, or Angrboða the happy… Happiness is an illusion. It's those little seconds right before the axe behind your neck falls, or a loved one's smile right before they topple over, dead. It's the spider that's painted in jewels. It's the fucking sunbeam that blinds you! It's time for you to accept that and stop living up in the fucking clouds! Happiness makes me feel-"

"Trapped."

It wasn't Luna that had cut her off, emphasizing the lone word with a step forward. It had been Floki. There was no mistaking it. His voice was simultaneously gruff and high pitched, as if he was permanently holding back a peal of laughter. His accent was thick, pulling hard at the edges of his words, but it was English alright. He was speaking English… Or had she been speaking their language? It didn't matter… She understood him.

"You understand me?"

And like an idiot, she asked the obvious. Luna jutted herself into the conversation, smug smile littering her face. Right, tongue first, smile second, face last.

"I put a translation spell on us. I didn't think you would start threatening facial scalping and forced cannibalism right from the get go."

Floki, thankfully, seeing Harry gearing up to rage again, floated past Luna's interruption, garnering Harry's rapt attention right away.

"I understand you, not just your words, but that feeling. I told your mother the same thing when you were but a babe."

The implication of him saying _your mother_ felt like acid being splashed into her eyes. So much so, that she recoiled at the word, like a python curling in on itself. So, they believed whatever Luna had told them when she was passed out? They believed what the two had been discussing while Harry had thought they were not understandable? How? Harry hardly believed it and she had grown up with magic. These people were muggle. Shouldn't they be trying to burn them at the stake? Gauge their eyes out? Sacrifice them to their god or gods? She was getting off track again. They understood her, she could speak to them. If Luna wasn't willing to see reason, she could make them see the light.

"Then you understand! You got out of the trap when I died! Or my fake death was put into place… Still, you freed yourself from it. So, do the same for me. Let me out and I'll walk away. You won't see me again and we can all pretend this never happened. Just bend down and scratch out one of the runes and we can all go back to our lives."

For a split moment, one glorious second as his eyes darted to one of the dried runes, she believed she had won. Freedom was imminent. She could pretend none of this never happened. She could be Harriet Potter again, simple Harry. Orphan Harry, with hardly any friends, no family and no complications. Yes, it would be a dull life, a bit miserable, but she could make it work. Misery loved company and Merlin knows it called on her long enough for Harry to become reliant on that feeling. She didn't feel right, like herself, if she didn't feel at least a little miserable. But then he shook his head and glanced back up at her and that hope was lost. Serves her fucking right. When did anything ever go her way? Yes, that faint knocking was misery banging on her bloody door.

"It wasn't a trap. Not the happiness. I know that now. I was my own trap. I refused to accept happiness because of my own insecurities. It's easy to shy away from happiness when you know the pain that comes with it when it is taken from you. If I could go back and live just one day with you and Helga on that beach, smiling, laughing, even if I had to live through another hundred of your deaths, I would do so."

Bargaining had not worked. Plan B then, scaring the holy spirit out of them until they set her free. Harry schooled her face, lurked closer to Floki, eyes darkening as she spoke with flat, apathetic tones.

"Do you want to die? Do you want móðir to?"

Harry didn't realize her slip up, not even when a sparkle set ablaze in the depths of Floki's own eyes. Instead, she carried on, whispering conspiratorially, as if letting him in on life's big mysteries.

"Because that is what is going to happen. Everyone around me dies. Horribly. You won't see it coming, but oh, it'll come. She'll go first, bloodily, screaming, and then the hatred will set in. You'll hate me alright, but in the end, it will take you too. Then it will spread in the village, like a plague, all those you love, all those you talk too, drop, drop, drop, drop. Dead!"

Harry matched the drop with a finger tap on her invisible bars, before slamming her fist against the see-through prison wall on the word dead, watching as it flared with red lightning. He flinched, but only momentarily. Instead of retreating like she had expected him to, he leant in close, nose nearly touching hers if it weren't for the seal she was trapped in, squarely looking deep into her eyes, unafraid. In fact, he looked like he knew exactly what she was doing, what she would do and what it would end in.

"If that is what the gods have instore for us, then so be it. But first, there will be a few days of laughter and beaches. I told you how much I would be willing to pay for that."

Harry growled and diverted attention to the quietest of the trio in front of her, the people in the back seemingly having decided not to interfere. When her gaze landed on Helga, the woman's eyes grew wide, as if she was a deer that had spotted the wolf about to lunge.

"Helga, please, fucking listen to me! I'm trying to protect you! You love him, don't you? Deeply? Then get him out of here. Turn your back and walk away. You can live a happy, full life! Together! Just bloody walk away!"

Wrong choice of words. It didn't scare her, it didn't make her run from the room, dragging Floki, no, it squared her shoulders and gave her strength. Merlin, what would it take to scare these people? Did she really have to skin Luna, because with the way she was feeling, she was all to happy to give that option a go.

Before anyone could speak, Helga crossed the border of the seal proudly. Harry flinched as the woman brought a hand up, expecting a hit, when all she gained was a soft palm on the cheek, forcing Harry to look at her dead on. Her smile was sad… So sad…

"It would neither be happy nor full without you in it."

Harry's eyes closed, and she took a moment, just one, to enjoy the hand upon her face, warm, gentle. Home… But it wasn't, she couldn't let it be. All Harry ever bought was destruction, sour and rancid, being Angrboða would not change that fact. They would die… They always did… She couldn't let them die because of her selfishness… Merlin, she wanted to believe, she wanted a home, a family, but not at the price of it being taken away… No… There was only one way then…

Harry opened her eyes and smiled, just as sad as Helga, as she reached up and laid a hand on the woman's shoulder. Her burnt, bloody hand stained the dress, tainting it, just like Harry would to them if she stayed.

"I'm sorry…"

Helga grew confused, the look on her face made Harry feel like a inferi, but that only lasted a second as Harry used her shoulder to turn her around, using her extra height against the woman as she curled one arm around her neck, bending her at the waist, placing her free hand over the side of Helga's head, over her ear, her neck balancing in the crux of her tightening arm. One twist and her neck would snap like a twig. She knew this would work, after all, she had used this exact way to kill Antonin Dolohov after she had tracked him down after the war. The bastard hadn't expected her to fight like a muggle and had not been prepared to fight against it. Cycles. Everything was swings and roundabouts. Slowly, she turned them both to face Floki.

"Let me out or I'll snap her neck."

He didn't move, Harry tightened her arm and pushed further on Helga's head, Helga, in turn, choked. He dropped at the noise, reaching for a rune. Good. No one had to get hurt. Just scratch it… Scratch it… Scratch it…

"Don't! Harry wouldn't do such a thing! She's playing you-"

To cut Luna off, she tightened her grip on Helga further, grimacing when she saw from the corner of her eye that her neck was turning blue. Let go… No… She couldn't. It was for their own good. They would die otherwise, Harry was like a disease, she knew that. If she stayed she would infect them, kill them… There was no other way.

"Oh, I wouldn't, would I? She's dead sooner or later with me around. Me doing this is just speeding up what is to come."

Floki touched a rune, thumb just about to scratch through the blood, when both Helga and Harry spoke up, although Helga's voice was garbled, rough, breathless.

"Do it! Let me out!"

"Don't! She won't hurt me!"

The red haired woman had pushed herself into the door frame, Luna was simply watching Harry, bear man had unhooked his axe, the blonde woman was holding him back and that thing was still playing with its little trinkets. Floki, well, he just looked up at Harry.

"No."

Harry breathed heavily through her flared nostrils, words bitten out through clenched teeth.

"What do you mean no? I'm choking her out! I'll snap her neck if you don't hurry the fuck up!"

The bastard grinned at her as he stood, his posture casual and relaxed.

"No. I won't. I failed you once, I won't do it again. You won't either. You may have my sardonic nature, but you have your mothers heart. Helga's heart. You wouldn't be threatening this otherwise. You're trying to protect us, you said so yourself. I do not know what you have lived through. I do not know your fears. But I do know your eyes, I know your heart as if it was my own. You see enemies everywhere, but there are none to be found. We are not your enemies. You are not the enemy. We are family. This is home."

Then he too stepped into the witch's seal and Harry's eyes darted around the room. Why weren't they attacking? Why weren't they yelling? Why weren't they angry? She was going to kill one of them! They should have attacked, they should have killed her already-… Oh. She was never going to kill Helga, she knew that now… She had been planning on angering them enough for them to attack her. Kamikaze's, hail Mary's and suicide missions where the only things Harry knew how to enact and play out now. Once again, she locked eyes with Floki.

"You don't remember us well, and the memories you have are hazy, that much Siggy has told me. But there is love and happiness there, I know that much. Feel it. Think upon it. We can have that again. Happiness is no trap. You are the trap, like I was. Let it go. Let it go and be happy with me, with your móðir… Let it go Angrboða."

Angrboða. That was her. She was Angrboða. She was Harriet too, she had lived with that name for so long for it not to be, but first, before the war and pain and blood, she had been Angrboða. She had a family. She had a home. She had that tree, beach and pathway. They were hers just as much as Godric's hallow, the room of requirement or the sky when she was on her broom. The two names, the two people, they weren't different entities, they were the same being. They were her. She didn't have to choose either or. She could be both… She _was_ both. The war inside of her head settled to a reflective pond, the oncoming memories no longer burning her brain but feeling warm, soft, like being wrapped in a blanket after being in a snow storm.

Harry looked down at her arm, at the back of Helga's head, her mothers head, a mother she was choking, and her hand and arm violently shook. Oh Merlin, what was she doing? She'd hurt her… She wasn't… She wouldn't… Her arm slacked and she pulled away, backing up until her back thunked against the window, even then, she tried to push further away from the pair, from the room, from what she had done. Her voice cracked and splintered from the tears that cascaded down her face, chest quaking with sobs.

"I'm sorry… I wouldn't… Sorry… I didn't mean to-"

Her vision blurred from the tears, transforming everything to masses of colour. All apart from her hands, cradled at her chest, shaking fiercely, burnt and bleeding. The hands she had nearly killed her mother with. The sobs came harder and her knees gave out. Still, she pushed herself further into the wall. Helga dropped down in front of her and Harry cowered further away, seeing a flash of uncle Vernon on the back of her eyelids, expecting the blows to come. They never came, she was only pulled into a strong hug.

"Shhh, shhh, It's fine. You're fine. We're fine. Shhh, shhh."

Harry felt a bigger hand on her head, stroking her hair, as Floki joined them in the huddle. His voice enveloped them both as he brought them to his chest.

"You're home now."

* * *

 **Questions & Answers:**

 **Where is Ivar?**

There was a little sneak peak of him this chapter, but fear not, Ivar will make a full appearance in the next chapter! So, not a long wait now. P.S, I know in canon, Ivar and Angrboða were not the same age, I believe Angrboða is older? (It's been awhile since I've re-watched the seasons, so don't take my word for it) But hey, this is fanfic, I've fiddled with the ages a little XD.

 **What about all their belongings? Where are the Potter's things?**

In short? Gone. They're back in the wizarding world. Harry was practically jumped by Luna, she had nothing on her but her wand, so everything is gone. Why have I done this? Well, Harry is going to have an edge over people to begin with, after all, she has magic while a majority of people she meets will not. Having the invisibility cloak, money from the vaults and all the other heirlooms would just make her over powered. Plus, I love a story where the protagonist has to suffer and adapt a little. It'd be a little boring if Harry had everything from the get go. Let's just say it's going to be a very bumpy ride for Harry adapting to Viking lifestyle, the era she finds herself in and the people she will be surrounded with.

 **Why did the seer knock her out when she was calming down?**

This is the seer we're talking about, he just knows things. Plus, in no way, shape, or form was Harry calming down. She got a bit dazed by the on flood of memories she had believed not her own, and that stalled her for a moment, but that peace wouldn't have lasted long. Harry, even in the books, when faced with confusion or tough situations falls back into anger, and I've tried to keep that true in this fic. The seer simply knocked her out before she started raging again XD.

 **Is Angrboða Harry, and Luna Siggy Jr? Have they taken over their bodies?**

Yes, Harry is Angrboða and Luna is Siggy Jr, and no, they haven't taken over their bodies. They _are_ them. I hope this chapter explains that and how it came to be well enough. There's still some little questions and mysteries to find out, but I'm keeping those under wraps until it's time to face them in the fic 😉.

 _ **If anyone has any questions, don't hesitate to ask!**_

 _ **NEXT UPDATE:**_ I have one more exam for this year at university, a lovely four hour one, next week on Thursday. So, there will be no update before then, as I'll be cramming as much as I can… Joy. Hence why, instead of chopping this monstrous 9k word chapter into parts, I've kept it together to hopefully tide everyone through and make up for the little wait that is about to happen. However, I do have half of next chapter prepped and ready to get back to after my exam, so the next chapter to this fic should be out next Saturday/Sunday. Monday at the very latest.

 _ **THANK YOU**_ to all the reviewers! Followers! And those who favourited! I really do hope you guys are liking this so far.

 **Please drop a review if you have the time, they make me smile and keep me motivated** **.**

~carelessdodger.


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